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The accidental ecologist

For 30 years and counting, John Rufino has been driven by a fervent need to perfect the craft of roasting coffee beans.

In the process of creating a perfectly roasted coffee bean, John Rufino developed a technique that saves on gas and emissions. His company buys green beans and uses a hot-air convection system for roasting.It does not require the standard after-burner, which typically has a high output of emissions. (JIM ROSS FOR THE TORONTO STAR)

By Pamela CuthbertSpecial to the Star

Wed., June 3, 2009

For 30 years and counting, John Rufino has been driven by a fervent need to perfect the craft of roasting coffee beans. In the process, the owner of Classic Gourmet Coffee, in Concord, says it's something of a happy surprise that he's also an eco-leader in a business that is notoriously costly to the environment.

"I found a system that saves on gas and emissions," says the electrical engineer, standing in his pristine, 1,900-square-metre facility that is North America's first stainless steel coffee plant. "But I got there by fluke because my motivation was more economical than environmental."

The coffee sector is by nature a long-distance one. Worse, it's generally associated with issues as black as a shot of dark-roast espresso, such as deforestation, pesticide-related pollution and poor labour practices. Little wonder the organizers of the Fair Trade certification chose it as their first product to target.

But whereas fair trade and organic labels are occupied with the growing and harvesting of the bean, Rufino's work focuses on the other end of the process: the roasting or finishing step of the raw material before it's ready to grind.

Rufino's taste for fine coffee started in childhood, in the southern Italian region of Calabria where he recalls his mother roasting coffee beans at home over the fire and adding coffee to his milk at lunchtime. "Espresso was a way of life in Italy," he says.

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He moved to Canada and later opened a bakery where he had a 10-kilogram coffee roaster in the back. "I wasn't satisfied with the coffee here, so I wanted to do something on my own."

Experimentation began in earnest at the bakery, including a bout of caffeinated jitters so serious he felt his spine shake. "I was testing 30 espressos a day." Burnout ensued, but Rufino picked up the pursuit again and opened a dedicated coffee roasting company in the late '80s and, with an eye to energy savings, Classic in the mid-'90s.

Classic buys green beans and uses a hot-air convection system for roasting, which includes recirculation of gasses and does not require the typically standard after-burner.

When the company commissioned Jacob Friedman of Ryerson University's department of mechanical and industrial engineering to assess the company, the findings were better than expected, says Rufino. Savings in both CO2 emissions and natural gas consumption came in at 59 per cent when compared with a traditional roaster of the same capacity. (Classic can process 450 kg per hour with an annual capacity of about half a million pounds.) The system includes a super-sensitive modulating flame in the roaster that allows for temperature adjustments – thousands of settings in one-tenth of 1 per cent increments – a "green coffee loading and cleaning tower" that also disposes of lesser (immature) berries and a self-cleaning vacuum system for transport to the onsite packing plant.

"Artisan roasting is a great passion. I know, I did it for years," says Rufino. "But a computer is more consistent."

Since Rufino's ultimate test is one of taste, these finely tuned elements, along with suppliers from more than 40 countries, a judging panel for "cupping," or assessing each new supply and blend, funnel into a company program that includes training for restaurant clients. Staff are shown how to pull a perfect espresso, how to adjust a grinder to the proper setting and how to best make drip coffee.

Chris McDonald, co-chef and co-owner of Cava and its sister café, Xococava, has bought five blends – all of his needs – from Classic for a number of years.

"One thing I can say for sure is that this coffee tastes better to me," says McDonald. "Besides, I want to work with a local roaster. It's part of having relationships with my purveyors."

As for the green quality of the beans, Rufino says as the demand for organic and fair trade rises, his system of segregated silos for these specialty blends means he's ready to shift with the tide. "There's no cross-contamination, no mixing."

His next challenge will be the source of energy his business employs. Solar-power, perhaps.

Pamela Cuthbert is a freelance writer and founder of Slow Food Toronto.

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